The present invention relates to a new and improved construction of apparatus for supplying or charging spinning preparatory machines with cans or the like.
Modern day spinning machines of high production capacity require efficient techniques for supplying the material which is to be processed. Attempts have been made to more rationally solve the problems of transporting and supplying the fibrous material which is to be processed and to automate these operations as far as possible.
In German Pat. No. 1,266,672, corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 3,443,287, there is taught to the art an apparatus wherein empty cans are transported upon transporting trolleys laterally to a drawframe, and individual cans, or also pairs of cans, are pushed by a first pushing or pusher device into the drawframe where they are filled with fiber sliver and from which location they are subsequently pushed by a second pusher or pushing device onto an empty transporting trolley held in a preparatory state. As soon as a trolley is fully loaded with cans, then it is manually removed and a new trolley with empty cans is brought into a preparatory position while the empty trolley is dragged around the machine from the can input or infeed side to the can output or delivery side by means of a transporting cable provided at the machine frame base.
When using this state-of-the-art apparatus the procedure which must be employed is cumbersome inasmuch as each time that a transporting trolley is emptied or filled, respectively, a new trolley must be placed at the can input side and a trolley filled with full cans must be transported away from the can output side by the operator. This apparatus therefore is not suitable for automated operation.
Another prior art device for exchanging cans at spinning preparatory machines has been disclosed in German patent publication No. 1,172,997 wherein such device is mounted at a two-head drawframe and comprises a transporting belt or a transporting trolley for transporting the cans to the drawframe and a pusher rod which pushes two empty cans from the transporting belt or from the transporting trolley, respectively, into the drawframe where such cans are filled.
As the cans are filled the drawframe is brought to stand-still and the cans are pushed back along the same path onto the transporting belt or onto the transporting trolley, as the case may be. Such transporting belt or transporting trolley is then subsequently moved through a distance corresponding to the diameter of two filled cans in a manner such that two empty cans are again positioned in front of the drawframe and can be inserted by the pusher rod into the drawframe.
This can exchange device achieves a continuous can transport or feed to and from a position in front of the drawframe, but the cans, however, are not continuously transported to and from the filling positions. The application of this device at modern day drawframes operating at high speeds and with high production capacities is not feasible inasmuch as the drawframes must be brought to standstill each time that a can is filled.